FIR against constable couple

After an 82-year-old widow moved the Bombay High Court alleging her son and daughter-in-law threw her out of a room owned by her late husband, the police have finally its broken its protracted silence. Kanchan Chaudhari reports.

After an 82-year-old widow moved the Bombay High Court alleging her son and daughter-in-law threw her out of a room owned by her late husband, the police have finally its broken its protracted silence.

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They have registered an FIR against the couple, who serve as constables in the Mumbai police.

Hindustan Times had, on August 23, first reported the plight of the widow, Savitribai Sawant, who had alleged that her son Atul and daughter-in-law Savita had regularly harassed her and thrown her out of the room in a co-operative housing society.

Last week, during the course of arguments on her petition, Public Prosecutor, Dr. F. R. Shaikh, informed the court that the FIR was registered by the Kalachowkie police station, nearly two years after the complaint was lodged. The couple has, however, not yet been arrested.

Savitribai’s counsel, Gunratan Sadawarte said the FIR has been registered under sections 341 (wrongful restraint), 323 (voluntarily causing hurt), 504 (intentional insult with an intention to breach of the peace), 506 (criminal intimidation) and 34 (common intention) of the Indian Penal Code (IPC).

They began living with her in 2003, when she was diagnosed with cancer.

But soon the elderly widow realised her son and daughter-in-law were interested in the room rather than serving her during her illness.

She alleged, in her petition, that on October 25, 2008, her daughter-in-law had badly beaten her up and thrown her out of the room. Ever since, the 82-year-old has been living at the mercy of her neighbors.

Meanwhile, the high court has directed Sadawarte to join the couple and Savitribai’s other sons as party respondents to her petition in order to consider her plea under the Maintenance and Welfare of Parents and Senior Citizens Act, 2007.

She has also sought possession of the room, and setting up of tribunals as provided in Maintenance and Welfare of Parents and Senior Citizens Act, 2007. According to her lawyer, delay in implementing the legislation has left lakhs of senior citizens across the state helpless, because tribunals as envisaged under the law were not set up in the state yet.

The matter is slated to come up for further hearing on September 8.